


Will you be my future or just an escape?

by crookedspoon



Series: Exchange Fics [40]
Category: Suicide Squad (2016)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/F, Gift Fic, Nightmares, Sex as Coping Mechanism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-24
Updated: 2019-08-24
Packaged: 2020-09-25 21:48:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20378650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crookedspoon/pseuds/crookedspoon
Summary: June still has nightmares sometimes. Somehow, they cope.





	Will you be my future or just an escape?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [girlsarewolves](https://archiveofourown.org/users/girlsarewolves/gifts).

Their evenings start innocently enough. They get takeout for dinner, curl their feet under their tushes on the couch, and throw a thick blanket over their knees. Sometimes there's an argument over who gets to choose the movie they're going to watch; most of the time, there is not. They pretty much enjoy the same types of movies: violent and dark, or creepy and suspenseful, or a mix of those. (Unless Harley wants to have a good cry over a romcom, tissues at the ready, and wheedles June until she gives in.)

No matter the movie they watch, however, Harley is restless, as though she likes being a nuisance. She steals June's food from her takeout container, leans over for refills, throws their blanket down when she gets up to pee. _And don't you dare continue without me. I know what frame we were at!_

Sometimes it's calculated. Sometimes she slurps her noodles loudly to break up the tension on the screen, as much for June's sake as for her own.

June still has the occasional nightmare, vivd recollections of the time she shared her body with the Enchantress. She maintains it's not the horror movies that trigger them, but Harley is unconvinced. Slasher movies sometimes leave _her _with a thick knot in the pit of her stomach – though to be fair, she wouldn't admit that they affect her, either.

She's in control of her life again. So is June. Harley has to trust her to know her own limits, just as June trusts her to do the same.

It's not always easy.

"It's like the Enchantress has left a shadow on my soul," June murmured once, back pressed against the headrest, knees hugged into her chest, making her look so slight and small. "It's like she's amplified all the bad parts of me, and left them there to fester and corrupt anything she hasn't touched."

Harley had thrown her arms around her then, as much to give comfort as to receive it herself, and rubbed her cheek against June's head, so she wouldn't feel the 'Rotten' tattoo along her jaw like an itch.

It's times like this when words are not enough to address the vastness of the pain they carry, and so they do not attempt to frame it in words. They use their mouths to nip and kiss, their hands to clutch and scratch, to take and give what they need.

Harley raises long welts on June's back with her fingernails that draw June away from her black thoughts and back into her body. She shudders and cries out into Harley's mouth. 

Their past has left indelible marks on them, visible or invisible, that have effects on them to this day. They're survivors, both of them, but to survive, they need to escape sometimes. A few scratches, a few bites here and there can work wonders in getting them out of their heads.

When June tackles her onto her bed and attacks her mouth with hers, that ferocity is all her own. She is free of the Enchantress' control over her and her reality; she no longer has to be afraid of touching Harley for fear of breaking her; she can explore her own strength now without holding back any more than she needs or wants to. There is no demonic entity inside her anymore that might take over whenever June lets her guard down.

In the beginning, when she'd been unsure whether they could do this, live free in the world outside of Belle Reve, together, she clung to the belief that what they had done or who they had been doesn't define them, that they could rise beyond all of that somehow and remake themselves into something new, something better than before. Without negating or denying their flaws, their struggles, everything that makes them ugly and unlovable in their own eyes.

Now, she can suck Harley's nipple between her teeth and know the desire to be her own. A desire to bring pleasure to her partner, not a desire to subjugate and rule her. Harley is beautiful and fearless and stays with June even through her nightmares, even through all the doubt and hopelessness that sometimes take hold of her. Stays and supports June even when she's battling her own demons.

June wishes to be strong like her. To be strong _for _her.

Lips locked and fingers clasping damp skin, they hold their demons at bay for the night.

It's a blind and desperate tussle then, their love-making, just a clambering for some kind of release, any kind. They grind against each other, kiss and grope and tug each other's hair. It grounds them in the moment. Their breaths are hot against each other's mouths, their moans breaking the hushed silence. The sheets rustle and cling to them as they roll across the bed, trying to find just the right position they need in that moment.

Hours can go by like this, slick, breathless hours that are filled with sharp gasps and drawn-out groans and slurred sentences uttered so quickly they might be mistaken for magic incantations.

It's usually Harley who breaks first, shuddering and short of breath and crying from the overstimulation. Her mouth works around unspoken syllables until her trembling subsides, and June lies down next to her, gathering her into her arms and trying hard not to set her off again. Harley is snoozing against her soon, supple and warm.

June kisses her sweat-soaked temple, feeling sated and spent and settled in her skin again. Her head is free of dark thoughts and nasty urges. All she's aware of is the pleasant thrum of the fresh bruises she carries and the scratches that are like lines of fire down her arms and back. That, and the disbelieving gratitude she feels for having Harley in her life, who never bails even when June's inner turmoil and her neediness make it tough to live together.

Maybe Harley needs her just as much, and that's why she won't leave. Maybe they both need each other too much. But it seems to be working out for them so far.

Otherwise June couldn't let herself sink into sleep beside Harley so easily, secure in the knowledge that there will be no more nightmares that night.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Those Nights" by Bastille.


End file.
